PUBG Mobile - Chicken Dinner in Your Pocket

The battle royale genre has exploded last year and it seems like every new release has a battle royale mode now. But it all started with one game that everyone and their grandma probably knows about by now. Of course, I’m talking about PlayerUnknown’s Battleground. It was a big success on the PC and later on consoles, but right now we’re going to be talking about the mobile version. In my opinion, it’s one of the best free to play mobile games out there. It does a really great job at transferring that PUBG experience to mobile devices, but let’s dive in a bit deeper shall we?

As I said, the core PUBG experience is there. You skydive down to a huge island along with 99 other players, find weapons and other resources, and then duke it out inside an ever-shrinking circle, last man (or woman) standing wins. Now, the mobile version has some slight differences but it’s pretty damn close to the PC or console versions.

As with most mobile shooters, the controls aren’t that great but they aren’t bad either. On the right, you have on-screen buttons for jumping, crouching, going prone, aiming and shooting. On the left, you have an on-screen analog stick which works pretty well honestly. Tencent Games (the developer of the mobile version) even added a nice feature that locks your character into sprinting.

You move the camera by sliding your thumb across the screen and sometimes you’ll press the shoot button, which is a no-no in PUBG because you can potentially reveal your location. Thankfully, the button layout is fully customizable from button size to button placement. You can really set it up the way you want to. There are also buttons for opening your backpack, reloading, switching weapons and even for looking around while sprinting (like the alt key for the PC versions).

Tencent Games also did a great job by automating some actions. For example, your character will automatically pick up and load guns and will also equip attachments automatically (you can do it manually too from your backpack menu). Items like medkits and armor will also be picked up and equipped automatically. These items will also show up as yellow in the little loot menu which is pretty handy.

As for the maps available, they’re all there. However, for some reason you have to download all of them except Erangel (the alpha map) which is playable right from the get-go. You have an on-screen minimap too that you can tap to view the whole thing. It’s the same as the PC and console versions but there are a few little bonus features.

If another player is nearby a footstep indicator will appear on the minimap. The same goes for gunshots and even silenced gunshots. Now, you may think that this makes silencers completely useless but hold your horses. The indicators for silenced shots will be much more opaque and will be shown very briefly. These indicators are a great feature if you don’t have good headphones or if you’re playing in public.

I should probably mention that there are microtransactions but the items you get are purely cosmetic. Overall though, PUBG Mobile is a great mobile game and is as fun to play as its bigger counterparts. PUBG Mobile gets a solid 8.7/10 from me and I would recommend picking it up. It’s out on both iOS and Android so you should all be covered. For more mobile games news and reviews stick with your favorite mobile games news site, GameBuz.